Ecological carrying capacity evaluation for villages’ spatial planning in rural revitalization strategy in gully regions of the Loess Plateau (China)

Since the implementation of Chinese Western Development Strategy, gully regions of the Loess Plateau experience rapid development. Large number of residents living in gullies move to tableland, village combination and extension come to be a common phenomenon. Due to the neglect of ecological carrying capacity evaluation and the lack of scientific methods for human settlement planning, the unreasonable village combination and extension cause severe damage for the natural environment, low quality living environment, large waste of resource and lots of unnecessary investment. In this paper, cultivable land, water resource and infrastructure are figured out as three important limiting factors for the ecological carrying capacity evaluation. Grid computing method is used to draw distribution maps for each factor. After overlaying these distribution maps, the space distribution of ecological carrying capacity can be visualized. Tao Qu Yuan village is chosen as a research object for its high ecological carrying capacity. According to the ecological carrying capacity evaluation, the priority areas for new immigrants can be fixed, natural resource and social resource can be saved, and investment for new construction can also be reduced. Results summarized by this method can be used as guideline for the future village planning.